SafeOnline Automatically securing HTTP sites!

Hello.

First time here so please be kind!

I have just bought PrevX 3 with SafeOnline (the lastest version 3.0.5.67)

I notice that when I visit a website (HTTP or HTTPS site), SafeOnline adds the site to its list of protected sites. It seems to do this for ALL sites - I don't want it doing that!

For HTTP sites at least, I cannot see this has happend by looking at the tab in the window pane. If I click on the tab, the button says "Add Protection" indicating the site is not protected.

If I click Configure I see the site in the protected list with Security Configuration ON MAXIMUM. If I press close (not save) the site gets protected and the button changes to "Website Protected".

My questions are:

-- Should SafeOnline be automatically adding entries to EVERY website I visit (or just the HTTPS ones, or never).

-- Should the HTTP sites have their protection set to MAXIMUM by default?

There is a BUG here I think. It could be the site is added when I press configure. I would appreciate it if others could confirm if this is happening to them.

 

Hello,
Welcome to the forum The behavior you're experiencing is intentional: clicking Configure will automatically configure that website to be protected with the default security policy. You can lower protection if wanted, but this allows you to add protection and customize it in one click rather than having to manually add each website.

Let me know if you have any further questions!

 

Thanks.

I worked out that it happens when I press configure and if I just leave it alone nothing will be added. (Alternatively, I can manage my list of sites from the PrevX 3.0 settings screen).

But it doesn't add the site with the default configurations (LOW for HTTP, MAXIMUM for HTTPS); it adds it as MAXIMUM in each case. Perhaps this is intentional, but it would be nicer for the user to start with the default settings and then he/she can change them if wanted.

This is no big deal as I can simply remove the site if I don't want it, or adjust its settings.

 

I understand what you mean - however, we've taken the approach that if the user is going to configure a website, they most likely are going to want to enable the full protection on it. Therefore, we automatically bump up the protection for that specific domain to maximum, however, I understand where the confusion may lie.

Ill see if we can make this process more logical - in the meantime, you can either configure the level differently or remove the domain from the list of configured domains if wanted.

Thanks for the clarification!

 

I have been using this for a number of days. I am experiencing some problems with firefox (3.6) occasionally losing access to sites (as if the DNS server does not work). When this happens i have been closing firefox and re-starting. It happens randomly but often enough to be annoying.

I wondered if there was an incompatibility with the BrowserDefender plugin so I have disabled that and will see what happens.

Funny thing is the tab menu has now moved to a different place. Before uninstalling BrowserDefender the tab was in the Window pane (with the minimise and maximise buttons - a bit ugly). Now it is sitting above the address bar - much neater.

Lol

Where should it be exactly, I can't find a screen dump anywhere.

 

It's definitely possible that there could be an incompatibility between the two. A scan log may help find the cause - if you click Tools > Save Scan Results and send this to report@prevxresearch.com, we'll try and implement a workaround which should correct the issues.

Regarding the tab positioning - it does change periodically depending on what other browser plugins are in place. Prevx doesn't "actually" load into the browser - instead, it dynamically draws the tab into the correct place, so browser plugins can sometimes affect the correct positioning.

 

I have deleted BrowserDefender and everything is now stable.

I might try WOT or McAfee SiteAdvisor. Has anyone used these with SafeOnline?

One problem I am having is I can't get Internet Explorer to delete cookies any more. I just hangs and has to be killed through the task manager. I dont know for sure its anything to do with SafeOnline though. Anyone else have this?

 

Try it on a non protected site as prevx will protect your cookies during a Protected Site session!

TH

 

Yes I tried that. Its no good. There is no problem with Firefox just IExplore.

 

I investigated further why I can't delete the cookie in IE.

First I tried to delete it from Windows Explorer - I couldn't. Couldn't even view its properties.

Booted into safe mode, logged in as my admin account and deleted it ok.

uninstalled PrevX 3 in safe mode.

Re-booted and internet explorer worked ok. No problem deleting cookies.

Re-installed Prev X 3 and the problem is back. I can't delete cookies in IE.

Doesn't seem to matter which web site I visit. If I just go to my usual home page I get a cookie and the problem occurs.

Is this a bug? Am I the only one?

 

I can delete cookies in IE8 without problems

TH

 

I did some more tests.

Everything works if I reboot: I can delete all cookies from the Internet Options applet in control panel; I can also delete them with CCleaner.

If I turn SafeOnline (PSO) off before using IE (Version eight) for the first time, I can use IE and delete all cookies as much as I like. I can also delete them with CCleaner. The cookies are obviously not protected yet.

Once I turn SafeOnline on and use IE, the very first cookie I get can never be deleted unless I reboot. It doesn't matter if I subsequently turn SafeOnliine off again - I still can't delete it. I have to reboot.

The second and subsequent cookies I get can be deleted (I have to manually browse for these to delete them individually though). I can't delete all cookies using IE or CCleaner as both applications "freeze" trying to delete the first cookie, which is locked in some way.

Incidentally, I cannot even view the properties of the locked cookie. "Something" is stopping me (PSO - I think).

As I said above, I don't have this problem if PrevX with PSO is not installed.

I would have thought the protection should be turned off if we stop PSO (using the off button in the configure panel) but its not.

This is my main problem with the software now. Everything else works. Just not this basic thing.

 

Thank you for the details, pling_man - SafeOnline will lock down your cookies to prevent outside programs from accessing them and the side effect of this is that it also prevents CCleaner from accessing them. Right clicking the Prevx tray icon and selecting Stop Protection "should" allow CCleaner/IE to access their cookies.

Could you let me know if this works by using the Stop Protection function instead of the on/off button? If so, we'll work on a more logical workaround.

Thanks!

 

Clicking Stop Protection does not fix it either.

 

In my experience when I use CCleaner when SafeOnline is also enabled, then CCleaner simply deletes all cookies. The reason I say this is that I've excluded some cookies in CCleaner so that my login details on websites don't disappear after I've done some cookie cleaning with SafeOnline.

When I disable SafeOnline, then CCleaner ignores the cookies I've excluded and thus my login details remain intact. But when I enable SafeOnline and then do some cookie cleaning, then CCleaner also deletes the login details from my excluded cookies.

One might think that when SafeOnline is enabled, that CCleaner shouldn't be able to delete any cookies at all, since they are protected with SafeOnline. If my understanding of this is incorrect, then please correct me.

 

OK, I have just about given up getting PrevX PSO to delete my cookie cache gracefully in IE (i.e. without hanging so I have to use Task Manger to kill it).

I have Windows Vista (32 bit), KIS 2010, Windows Defender.

This is what I have done to try to get it to work:

• Uninstalled PrevX from safe mode, rebooted.
  
• Uninstalled update for Internet Explorer 8 for Vista (go back to IE 7), rebooted
  
• Installed Internet explorer 8 update for Vista from Microsoft updates, rebooted
  
• Created new user profile, rebooted, log in as new user
  
• Installed PrevX with PSO.
  
• Stop monitoring, go to install mode
  
• Run internet explorer 8 for Vista
  
• Clear cookie cache and IE 8 locks up again.

This is as close I can get to a clean install. It just does not work. Perhaps there is a problem with this application under vista.

Fed up now, this has taken several hours going round in circles.

Should I escalate this to the support team?

 

Hello pling_man,
Sorry for the inconvenience here - we're currently looking for a workaround for the issue, but in the meantime, could you try this:

- Reboot your PC
- Before opening any browsers, right click on the Prevx tray icon and select Stop Protection, but instead of clicking Stop again, click the dropdown in the list and scroll to the bottom which reads "Remove Protection"
- Click Stop
- Try CCleaner now

If this still doesn't work, let me know. I just tried using CCleaner here and it worked fine so I wonder if this could be KIS protecting the cookies? Have you tried cleaning cookies before with SafeOnline not installed?

Thanks!

 

Yes. If I reboot and remove protection PrevX 3.0 I can use IE and delete cookies (either from IE or with CCleaner or by hand) as much as I like.

Its only when protection is turned on with the default SafeOnline LOW setting for my HTTP home page that the problem occurs. When I visit my home page, the cookie it gives me cookies cannot be deleted even if protection is subsequently turned off. Only a re-boot can help.

I don't think its KIS 2010, I did some tests yesterday with it removed KIS from my system and the problem was still there. To answer your question, I have used KIS and CCleaner together for some time and never had a problem deleting cookies.

Can you say if you have managed to reproduce the problem?

(I picked load protection to get PrevX monitoring again - hope this is right)